The Blacksmith's Girl

by Rosemary Aitken

If Vee had been surprised before, she was astonished now! It was one thing for the nieces to call here now and then – though even that was not approved of very much. It was quite another matter for Dorcas to call on them – Verity could not remember such a thing. Grandfather would have apoplexy at the very thought and Pa would side with him. There’d be no end of row.

  Dorcas laughed. ‘Verity Tregorran, you should see your face! I know what you’re thinking, but I meant what I just said. With a wedding coming she’ll want a bit of a hand. And someone to talk to, I shouldn’t be surprised. Woman needs her sister, at a time like this. So you tell your ma I’ll come, and never mind the men – without she sends word to say she’d sooner I stayed home!’

  Vee promised that she would, although it spoiled the afternoon – she felt like Sam Chegwidden at the forge, carrying a heated iron in the tongs, as if inevitable disaster was about to fall. She was almost glad to rescue Mercy from her post and claim the mended shawl.

  Her aunt had made a lovely job of mending it, as usual – Dorcas was clever with her needles and you could hardly see the join – and Vee thanked her with a hug. But that message weighed upon her like a ton of bricks as she set off across the cliffs again.

  And then, to crown it all, she saw that man again. She was certain – almost certain – that it was the one she’d seen before. Same thin build and beaky face, and battered bowler hat, but with a bicycle this time. She and Mercy were walking on the path that led up to the stile, and there he was ahead – with someone stocky, in another bowler hat – having some sort of heated argument. Seemed there’d nearly been an accident.

  ‘Can’t you learn when to stop? Coming careering round the cliffs – it’s downright dangerous! You’ll run into someone, next thing, if you don’t look out. Other people want to use this lane, you know!’ This other fellow seemed to have a pony and trap; he looked somehow familiar, but his back was to Verity and she could not see his face. She strained on tip-toe from behind a bush to see a little more, without drawing attention to the fact that she was there, when a cry behind made her wheel around.

  Mercy was up to her little tricks again, and was (naturally) nowhere to be seen. Vee went back to look and found her down a side path to the sea; tripped over on a stone and fallen into a furze bush by the path, screaming like a weasel because it hurt to move.

  ‘You little varmint!’ Vee seized her sister’s two arms and extracted her, then crossly mopped her bleeding knees and picked most of the prickles out of her. She was impatient to get back to the stile and get a better look, but by the time that Mercy had limped her tearful way back to the vantage place, there was no sign of anyone. The pony-trap had vanished and the men had gone.

  Here was a dilemma. Should she tell the police? Sergeant Jeffries had suggested that she did, if she saw the man again. But what could she tell him? Nothing new at all. He’d only laugh and call her fanciful again. Then, the answer came to her. Of course! Tomorrow, after work, she’d call and confide in Mrs Dawes. She was kind, she was a policeman’s wife and she’d know what to do.

  But there was still the problem of the message from Aunt Dorcas. Vee clenched her teeth and dragged a protesting Mercy home to deliver it. It was not as bad as Verity had feared – only a brief outburst from her pa – but there was an atmosphere at supper, and an outbreak of fierce, whispered arguing downstairs when she had gone to bed.

  And the visit to see Mrs Dawes next day was even less what she had hoped.

  Effie was entertaining her new step-mother to tea when the knock came on the door.

  Before that, the afternoon had not been entirely a success, though Amy (bless her) had conjured up the butter, flour and eggs to make a sponge, which – with the war – was a rare and splendid treat. The atmosphere was friendly, but without Pa there it was a little stiff. The problem was with names.

  Effie could not bring herself to call his new wife ‘Mother’ as he would have liked, ‘Mrs Pengelly’ was too stuffy, and ‘step-mother’ sounded like a villain from a fairy tale! But one couldn’t go on calling her ‘Mrs Richards’ now – though Effie accidentally occasionally did – and things were awkward till they settled upon ‘Jillian’, which solved the problem, for the most part anyway.

  Not that Jillian was difficult to like; quite the opposite, in fact. She was a small, thin, cheerful woman with a careworn face and a heart, as Pa said, ‘bigger than outdoors’. Many another woman might have borne a grudge, seeing that her son was blinded in the mine in that same accident which had crippled Pa, and for which – as leader of the team – Pa felt responsible. But Mrs Richards – Jillian! – took a different view.

  ‘Nobody knows mining like your pa – Capt’n Maddern told me that hisself – so if he didn’t see that rockfall coming, no-one would have done. And I’ve got him to thank that I’ve a son at all. Hadn’t been for throwing himself over Jimmy when he did, the boy would have died, for sure. And Walter’s been so good to us, these last few years. Treated Jimmy as though he was his own. Lad couldn’t have had a better father if his own had lived, or me a better ’usband. Did I tell you that he’s arranged a course, now, learning Jimmy how to re-cane chairs?’

  It was the first that Effie had heard of such a thing and she was grateful for the opportunity to talk about the boy. She’d always found it awkward to enquire after him. ‘Where is that to then?’

  ‘Has to go up Bodmin every week, Monday to Friday,’ his mother said, trying to sound proud but sounding rueful too. ‘Class is run by the society for the blind, so Walter and me have only got to find his keep, and that’s in a special hostel so it isn’t dear.’ She fumbled in the drawstring purse that dangled from her waist. ‘I’ve brought his first report to let you see – he’s doing well, apparently and “showing aptitude”.’ She took out a crumpled sheet and smoothed it flat.

  Effie understood at once. Jillian wanted to hear it read aloud again – she wasn’t very good at ciphering, herself. She obliged, with pleasure, then gave the paper back. ‘All the same, you’ll miss him dreadfully, I expect. Though if it means that you can come and visit me sometimes, I shall selfishly be pleased.’

  The woman laughed. ‘Perhaps I can arrange to come again, at that!’

  This visit was not a usual event. Jillian could not normally leave the house without the boy, and it was not easy to take him anywhere. In any case, she had rheumatic knees so it was hard for her to walk, and the horse-bus times in this direction weren’t convenient, so up to recently Effie had always called on them. But Jillian was finding the house too empty now, with Jimmy gone, when Pa was at the mine.

  So Pa worked out a scheme. He’d heard that the waggoner who served the tally-shop down at Penvarris mine came to the dairy factory now and then, to pick up new supplies, so he’d had a little word, and – for a consideration – the man had agreed that next time he was this way, he’d give Jillian a lift.

  He had delivered her today at two o’clock. ‘I should be back by five. Let’s just hope that nothing holds me up, or it will get too dark and we risk getting overturned by hitting something in the road,’ was his lugubrious farewell.

  No wonder Jillian had been a little tense at first. But she’d relaxed by now, enough to put the paper back into her purse and say, quite innocently, ‘There’s someone else your father’s going to miss. That Peter Kellow from next door, you must remember him? Gone to be a soldier – all of a sudden rush. Only left on Friday, went up London on the train, and his family had word from him today – he’s off to France before the week is out. Don’t know what got into him, he didn’t have to go, but when he makes his mind up there’s no changing him. Walt says there’s some girl he’s sweet on – ’e won’t tell me who – but apparently she’s upped and married someone else. Anyhow, your pa’ll miss him. They’ve got to be good pals. But there you are, the world goes on I suppose …’

  Effie made some indistinct response and got up to pour another cup of tea she didn’t want, but it hid her blushes as she turned away. ‘Speaking of wh
ich,’ she said, ‘I had a letter yesterday. Alex is …’ She broke off as there was a rapping on the door. ‘I wonder who that is?’ She went to answer it.

  It was Sergeant Jeffries. He was looking grim. There was a boy on a bicycle behind him at the gate.

  ‘Effie. Mrs Dawes … something’s come for you. Came to the police-house. I said I’d bring it down, but he insisted that he had to deliver it himself.’

  Effie looked at him, uncomprehendingly, and then at the boy who was walking up the path, holding something towards her in his hand. A telegram. Of course, she should have recognized the uniform! Even then she did not take in the significance.

  Only when she opened it and read the words: ‘It is my painful duty to inform you … died on escort duty …’ The world seemed to have stopped. There was a dreadful howling. She wished that it would stop. But she was doing it.

  She was aware that Sergeant Jeffries had taken her by the arm and was leading her inside. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I can’t go in. Alex won’t be there. He’s …’ She had stopped screaming, but she couldn’t cry. Nothing was real.

  Mrs Richards had appeared from somewhere and was offering her some tea. As if she would ever want tea any more! She shook her head and sat down on the chair. Sergeant Jeffries came back – she had not noticed that he’d gone – and tucked a rug around her and poured something down her throat. It tasted horrible and hot and stung her throat, but it must have done her good because the shivering slowly stopped.

  ‘She’ll sleep now for a little,’ she heard the policeman say. ‘Best thing for her, too.’

  She wanted to deny it – who could sleep with Alex dead? – but her eyes were closing and the voices were becoming far away.

  ‘I’ll stay with her,’ said Mrs Richards, or was that a dream? ‘I’ll send a message back to Walter with the cart. Better if Effie isn’t left alone.’

  And she must have stayed because the next time Effie woke, it was getting dark. The oil lamp was lighted and the fire was banked, and there were unfamiliar voices at the door.

  ‘No!’ That was Mrs Richards! What was she doing here? ‘You’ll do no such thing. Mrs Dawes is in no state to talk to anyone. No, not tomorrow either. She’s had bad news and there’s an end of it. I’m sorry, but that’s that. Yes, her husband. Thrown when his horse was frightened by a shell. She’s shocked half to death herself. Now go away and let the poor soul get a bit of sleep.’

  But the ‘poor soul’ had remembered – there was no more sleep that night.

  Part Three

  February 1916

  One

  Alex’s funeral was held at Falmouth, at his parent’s home, or rather at the little church nearby which he’d attended as a boy. His father, the Major, had arranged it all, from bringing the coffin back from overseas to the choice of hymns, the date of the service and the location of the grave.

  ‘Laid to rest among his ancestors,’ he said to Effie on that dreadful day, as he handed her into the carriage – pulled by the family’s one remaining horse – in which she and the older Mrs Dawes were to be conducted back towards the house. There, the best war-time funeral tea available had been laid on for the select mourners who had been invited to remain ‘for refreshment afterwards’.

  The Borough Police Commissioner was among them, and several other former colleagues from the Penzance Police Station, who had formed an arch of honour outside of the church. They were following with the other men on foot behind the coach, as they had done on the journey to the church. But there was no one from Penvarris, Nancarrow or Rosvene – even at the funeral itself – other than Sergeant Jeffries and Effie herself. Pa had volunteered to come, of course, but Mrs Dawes senior had made very clear that – though he’d had an invitation card – he wasn’t really expected to accept.

  ‘It’s very good of you, Mr Pengelly,’ she had said, on one of the rare duty visits she had paid since Alex died. ‘Of course you are a relative by marriage and all that. But you’d hardly know a soul and it must be very difficult for you to get away. Besides, wherever would you stay? I’d offer you a bed myself, of course, but we shall have a houseful, with my family. Scores of cousins – to say nothing of my aunts. And of course we’d understand if you decide that it’s too far! You wouldn’t be the only person unable to attend – even my other sons are serving overseas and won’t be there. We’re grateful for your willingness, of course, and we’ll see that you are mentioned in the press report. And don’t go to the expense of sending flowers up – we have a greenhouse full of blooms, the gardener’s brought white lilies on especially.’

  It hadn’t occurred to her father to send flowers anywhere, he had only thought of paying his respects and supporting Effie on the day, but he could take a hint. ‘I’d just be in the way,’ he told his daughter, when the woman had gone home and he and Jillian were sipping tea in Effie’s sitting room again.

  ‘Bossy besom!’ Jillian exclaimed, clearly insulted on poor Pa’s behalf. ‘It isn’t their place to plan the funeral like this, all single-handedly. Effie should have been consulted from the start.’

  ‘Perhaps it’s for the best, though, Jilly,’ Pa murmured peaceably, filling his pipe again before the fire. ‘I expect the Major knew what strings to pull. Otherwise the army might have buried him out there. That’s happened to a lot of poor fellows recently, I know. Cornish boys lying forever under foreign soil.’

  Jillian clucked her tongue impatiently. ‘But that Mrs Dawes wrote all the bereavement letters to acquaintances and sent out all the invitations to the funeral – on black-edged stationary showing their address. You know she did, you had a card yourself! You’d never think that Alex had a wife.’

  Effie listened vaguely, but in truth she hardly cared. Nothing had seemed real since she got that telegram. She’d gone on living only in a kind of dream. She could not rouse herself to anything – scarcely had the energy to wash and dress, and probably wouldn’t have bothered about eating anything, if it hadn’t been for Amy, who made little treats for her (though they tasted like sawdust, like everything these days). And without Jillian, who had more or less moved in, and Pa who came whenever possible, she might not even have been ready for the day itself.

  Jillian had helped her pick out a black dress and coat – off the shelf, since Effie wasn’t up to sewing anything. Alex’s mother had offered to send her own dressmaker by train, but Effie had turned that down so flatly it was almost rude. Instead she’d suffered herself to be taken into town to purchase a crape-trimmed mourning outfit from Westons’ shop – so with her best black boots, black gloves and hat, and one of the long crape veils that she’d been so scornful of, she looked respectably widow-like today. And thanks to Sergeant Jeffries, who arranged a trap to take her to the train and came with her all the way, she had managed to attend this funeral without absently missing her connection on the way.

  The senior Mrs Dawes had not approved at all. Quite early on she had written to confide that: ‘I confess I was alarmed when I learned that you propose to come by train – I’m of a generation which would privately prefer that the tender sex did not go to funerals at all (such things may be too much for their sensitivities) and that new widows should not go about in public – but I learn that, with the war, even the best families are doing these things now.’

  That was the only opposition Effie met. ‘Very brave,’ the awful cousins murmured as they squeezed her hand outside the church (or, if they were female, made imitation kissing motions at her cheek).

  But there was nothing brave about it. Effie could not cry – partly because she still did not believe that this was happening. How could it be Alex in that horrid wooden box? Any day, surely, there would be a letter from the regiment telling her that it was all a terrible mistake? In the meantime she would have to live and breathe and somehow manage to do what was expected at the grave.

  But at last it was all over and the coffin laid to rest. Her mother-in-law leaned back against the cushions of the coach. She, of course, was in deep
est mourning too, but contrived to look quite dashing in the latest style with black guipure lace insets at her neck, and trimming of jet-black beads round the edges everywhere.

  ‘Well, that went off as well as possible, I think!’ She wore a veil, of course, though just across her face, and throughout the service she had kept lifting it to dab her eyes with a special black lace-edged handkerchief. ‘Just remember, Ethel,’ – her in-laws always called her ‘Ethel’, which was properly her name, although Effie hated it – ‘there’s room for you here too, you know, whenever the time comes.’

  ‘Oh no, I couldn’t!’ Effie cried, appalled.

  ‘It’s customary in our family for women to be buried beside their husbands,’ Mrs Dawes said stiffly, obviously stung. ‘Though it may be different among your people, I suppose. Unless you have plans to marry someone else?’

  ‘Oh, course, not.’ Effie was embarrassed and confused. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Dawes. I thought for a moment …’ She tailed off, blushing. ‘I thought for a stupid moment you meant coming here to live.’

  ‘Oh my dear.’ It was the other woman’s turn to be embarrassed, now. ‘Of course there would always be a home for you with us. We could do no less for our son’s widow, if you needed it. But of course you have a family of your own back in Penwith, and we would not wish to press you to come here against your wish. And you’ll have money from Alex, so you won’t be in want. You could find a little cottage that might suit you, I am sure.’

  Effie nodded. There would be a pension from the army – they’d already been in touch – and a little from the police. More than enough to rent a little place.

  Though it occurred to her suddenly that she would have to think of doing so – she could not go on living as she was, expecting to move back into the police house at Rosvene, after the war. The Borough would have to send a replacement policeman now, and Sergeant Jeffries would want his cottage back. For the first time the realization came to her that, from here on, life was different. Alex was dead and he wasn’t coming back, and the future that they’d hoped and planned for was not a future, but a shattered dream.